All the members of Wilson live in Northampton NN1, except for
Mister E. Wilson, who is holed up just across the border in NN3.

I have known every single one of them for at least ten years,
and some members of the band go back a lot further than that.
Every single member of the band has been involved in music for
as long as I can remember. So we have a couple of things in common.
When we are not playing, writing or recording we are hanging
out in each others
company.

Our creative nerve centre is wherever MC Bot's computer is located at the
time. Like the Open University,
we go to it. When our lives are going smooth, MC Bot and Headstone
are working daily on the business of acquiring and mutating sounds,
writing and arranging new tunes and lyrics. Mister E. Wilson
and Agent Wilson are often in there too, making their contributions.

Our social headquarters are at the Racehorse pub in Abington
Square, where Pete Heyworth the landlord is endlessly patient with us.
Sometimes
he even lets us win the pub quiz. This is not as trivial as you
might imagine. Beer is at stake. Free beer. Cheers, Pete.

We also get to play at the Racehorse a lot. Sometimes we play
in the front bar at Pete's invitation. I enjoy these gigs immensely,
because it's a top challenge to take the pub on a quiet Sunday night and
turn it into a dark and rocking scene. This is largely achieved
with the help of our good friend Johnny P from Rugby. He will
show up with all manner of wild lighting, running movies and
interference all over the set. Johnny has worked with Spacemen
3, Broadcast and the Telescopes. He's a psychedelic master. Once
projected the legend "IN DUB WE TRUST"
across the stage for an hour.

Likewise, these sessions would be infinitely poorer if it wasn't
for the work of Steve Ward of Phoenix Soundworks. Steve is
the evil mastermind behind Fat Controller, who are also very
much sample-based rock, so he soon got the hang of mixing Wilson,
and he's been immeasurably helpful to the band over the last year or
so. The people who turn up and listen do their bit as well. We've
had some top nights down there.

We play in the back room of the Racehorse too. This room is like
the special room. It's quite an operation to put on a show there, but we have done
it ourselves once or twice. More often we have found ourselves
invited to play events back there, often for good old righteous
punk rock people like Stuff the Jubilee or the Anti-Nazi League.
In the back room there is a big old PA, with Skinner at the controls.
Skinner lives around the corner from me. He is involved with
an ancient, enormous German Shepherd and I've seen him playing the penny
whistle with my own eyes. He has a sort of Celtic dub outfit called
Tarantism, coming to a festival
in your town soon.

When we're not in the Racehorse we tend to gather in each others
houses, where we smoke while backgammon and records are played.
Some of Wilson's favourite records lately:

Ringleader, programmer, arranger. Professional musician since
September 1984.
Fender Telecaster, Burns, Yamaha, Hughes & Kettner Tour Reverb.
Committed, tragically, to raising a New Kingdom Egyptian villa
on the site of his Lebanese-style NN1 bolt-hole.

Timbales, congas, bongos, daraboukas, blocks and bells, all piled
into the back of a silver Peugeot station wagon and ready to
go. Formerly with Mystic Crew, Stranger Tractors, Sumosonic and
WARM. Has lived his entire life within the NN1 postal area.

Third original founder member and officially The Quiet One. Fender
Precision with Marshall amplification. This is her first serious
group, although she used to jam with members of Spacemen 3. Also
worked as a studio engineer. Without Misery we would be nothing.

Telecaster troublemaker and ambassador for the sport. Also leads
his own band, P-Hex, a gargantuan funk machine and possibly the
only Northampton band ever to play Washington DC go-go music.
Easily the most even-tempered member of the band, Steve has,
nonetheless, been known to manifest as Thanos The Monkey God.

Live electronics from this disturbing individual. Paces the Streets
Of Fear at the dark end of the Internet, leaking Wilson propaganda
along the way, and once made a country and western album. Conspiracy
theorist, cabbalist, maker of ridiculous wee noises that slice
through the mix and upset all, Mister E. Wilson is the mother
of all secret weapons.

Fat Controller are mental,
wrote Kerrang! Magazine. MC Bot was the singer. Has also sung
with President Bush (really), Sumosonic and the Rocking Turks.
With Wilson he does so much more, writing, programming and producing.
Has been known to get beaten up by members of the audience before
going onstage.

MC George, who guests with us on Istanbul Connection, has a life
story that has taken him from a playboy lifestyle in sixties
Istanbul to a flat above the Fire Station in downtown NN1. A
true Vegan with a supernatural sense of timing, his eccentric
take on the English language can sometimes obscure the magnitude
of his adventures. In a certain way he functions as the Wilson
guru. Once declared, in the middle of a New Year's Eve party,
"When I was a little boy, they hanged the Prime Minister."

Another guest who often adds another dimension to Wilson gigs.
Andy's monthly SKANK night at the Labour Club is a favourite place
for Wilson to hang out. He plays an extraordinary spectrum of
Jamaican music, from ancient sixties ska, through rocksteady
(my personal favourite!) and classic seventies roots rock reggae,
all the way to the mad techno/ska crossovers of today and tomorrow.

cant believe im gonna say this but...........i really miss the racehorse. I hear Pete is no longer the landlord,im sure it wont have the same atmosphere without him,good luck to him running his new bar. Botty ive known you since you were in the rocking turks, u havent change at bit, well not in looks, still a handsome devil lol.

cant believe im gonna say this but...........i really miss the racehorse. I hear Pete is no longer the landlord,im sure it wont have the same atmosphere without him,good luck to him running his new bar. Botty ive known you since you were in the rocking turks, u havent change at bit, well not in looks, still a handsome devil lol.